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In 1998, stunned by my only ever layoff, I began exercising skills (and, let's be frank, pleasures) I’d long left dormant: writing and traveling. A decade and a half later: so far, so good. In addition to Forbes, I’ve been published from Travel+Leisure and the Los Angeles Times to dozens of Lonely Planet titles. I can speak Japanese and French, read Korean menus and embarrass myself in Spanish, Italian and Chinese.
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The World's Rudest Nations For Travelers

Congratulations, my fellow Americans! We’re not the rudest nation on the planet. We’re not even in the top 5. USA! USA!

The travel search site Skyscanner.com surveyed its users about where the locals never smile and people are particularly unfriendly, and the nation with the most votes for rudest locals was…

Wait for it…

France (félicitations,mes amis!), followed by Russia. The survey received over 1,200 responses, 65 percent from the UK and Ireland, plus elsewhere in Europe, North America and Australia.

Rounding out the top five rudest countries were the UK, Germany and “Other” (those Others are the worst, don’t you think?). The US placed 7th, behind China.

Some of the perceived rudeness may be attributable to cultural differences rather than anything intentional. For example, says Tatiana Danilova, Skyscanner’s Russian Market Manager, “the Russian language is not as polite as English, so when Russians translate directly from Russian to English, it can sound rude to an English speaker even if they don’t mean it to.”

“We were surprised to see Russians come in second place,” says Skyscanner’s Travel Editor, Sam Baldwin. He attributes this in part to the “familiarity breeds contempt” phenomenon. Although Russia doesn’t compare with the Mediterranean as a tourist destination, as visa regulations have relaxed, Russian holidaymakers are increasingly flocking to the Mediterranean and coming into contact with people from other countries.

The same principle may apply to the French: “As our closest neighbors, there has long been a familiar rivalry between the UK and France,” Baldwin says, and the preponderance of responses from the British Isles may have contributed to this result. Still, Baldwin says, “Even the French acknowledge that the way they are perceived is not entirely without basis.” (In France’s defense, I’ve always found Parisians to be just as rude to each other as they are to foreigners. Outside of Paris – and even within the city – people can be as gracious as anywhere.)

The British, for their part, voted themselves “world’s worst tourists” in a previous Skyscanner survey.

The countries rated as having the least rude locals were Brazil, the Caribbean and the Philippines.

Skyscanner claims to be Europe’s leading travel search site, operating in over 25 languages with over 25 million visits and over 11 million unique visitors per month. It has offices in Edinburgh, Scotland and Singapore.

Here’s the complete list of responses:

Nationality

Percentage of votes

French

19.29

Russian

16.56

British

10.43

German

9.93

Other

6.37

Chinese

4.3

American

3.39

Spanish

3.15

Italian

2.24

Polish

2.24

Turkish

2.15

Indian

1.9

Swiss

1.9

Greek

1.74

Croatian

1.57

Austrian

1.41

Cypriot

1.24

Egyptian

1.24

Korean

1.24

Norwegian

0.99

Australian

0.91

Dutch

0.83

Irish

0.83

Swedish

0.83

Japanese

0.66

Danish

0.5

Canadian

0.41

New Zealander

0.41

Indonesian

0.41

Portuguese

0.33

Thai

0.25

Filipino

0.17

Caribbean

0.08

Brazilian

0.08

The travel search site Skyscanner.com asked where locals never smile and where people are particularly unfriendly, and the world’s rudest nation came up as…wait for it…France (félicitations,mes amis!), followed by Russia. The survey received over 1,200 responses, 65 percent from the UK and Ireland, plus elsewhere in Europe, North America and Australia.

Rounding out the top five rudest countries were the UK, Germany and “Other” (I find those Others just awful. Don’t you?). The US placed 7th, behind China.

Some of the perceived rudeness may be attributable to cultural differences rather than anything intentional. For example, says Tatiana Danilova, Skyscanner’s Russian Market Manager, “the Russian language is not as polite as English, so when Russians translate directly from Russian to English, it can sound rude to an English speaker even if they don’t mean it to.”

“We were surprised to see Russians come in second place,” says Baldwin. He attributes this in part to the “familiarity breeds contempt” phenomenon: as visa regulations have relaxed, more Russian holidaymakers flock to Mediterranean resorts, where they come into contact with other holidaymakers.

Another illustration of the principle: “As our closest neighbors, there has long been a familiar rivalry between the UK and France,” Baldwin says. “Even the French acknowledge that the way they are perceived is not entirely without basis.” And the British voted themselves “world’s worst tourists” in a previous Skyscanner survey.

Conversely, perhaps absence makes the heart grow fonder. The expensive Euro may be keeping Americans from traveling, explaining why, at least in this survey, “American” is not preceded by “ugly.”

The politest travelers in the survey came from Brazil, the Caribbean and the Philippines.

Skyscanner claims to be Europe’s leading travel search site, operating in over 25 languages with over 25 million visits and over 11 million unique visitors per month. It has offices in Edinburgh, Scotland and Singapore.

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The findings are quite accurate. We do not know about Brazil and Caribbean Islands. France, Germany, UK and a few more EU countries are not tourist friendly, especially if you cannot speak local languages. There is a racial bias too. Our experience with Filipinos, Philippines, Thailand and Thais has been wonderful.

I’m visiting France every year – it’s a pretty tourist-friendly country. As to Russia, the main issue is that people are not used to smile to you – it’s just not in the culture. They are not even allowed to smile on their passport photos – may not be accepted.

So what some treat as rudeness may have different roots.

On the other hand, the service in Russia (unless you’re staying in world-class hotels or restaurants) has lots of room for improvement, which may have created a feeling of rudeness to the poll participants.

There is also the inquisitive factor to be considered. Chinese are very curious about one’s age. Indians want to know one’s marital status and next as to how much one earns! An Indian can not help asking a Chinese as to how one can eat snakes. Also is too ready to intimate any visitor of the realtives he has abraos especially in the USA.The Sandinavians envy the Indians for the amount of SUN that shies

I’ve been in Paris last May, 2006 spring time. Wow! very romantic city. I din’t see they were rude. Paris cannot be the most visited city on earth if they were rude. Police on the street are accommodating as well, not the same in some Southeast Asian Cities. Anyway, try to visit Philippines soon.